Imperfect Automata
by hadesnothell
Summary: Their individual lives lying in ruins behind them, Super Android 17 and Dr. Myuu meet once more in death. They manage to resolve their differences and agree to give working together one last chance. Imperfect Automata is set within an alternative reality which explores the relationship between the strongest machine in the universe and the scientist who made him.
1. Chapter 1

There was a terrible ringing in his ears. His life had been taken from him so suddenly that initially he'd questioned whether he was actually dead, and standing alone in an interminable queue of silent ghosts awaiting judgement had been uncomfortably surreal. Now he was just a single soul lost amidst an eternity of murky blue and purple hues - colours that might have been beautiful in some other world - traversing a barren landscape that was blotted here and there with the peaks of caverns shrouded in darkness. He had been sentenced to Hell, of course. It was a realm void of hope, a nothingness so all-consuming that it was hard to process, and it was not entirely unfamiliar. He remembered what it was to exist in a dimension littered with malevolent spirits, the cold sting that accompanied each of them, and in particular the cold hands of the men who had birthed him into such a world. Yet the unnerving silence of this place hadn't seemed quite as devastating before. With their being drunk on theories and their then untested hypotheses, perhaps the sounds of his creators' voices had diluted the heavy sense of defeat that hung in the air.

His memories of what had happened on earth were hazy but the emotions they invoked were violent and vivid, and there was a small part of him that insisted he would be better off if he instead remembered nothing. From the bits and pieces of what he could put together, it seemed as though absorbing Eighteen's continuous stream of energy blasts had forced him into a state of paralysis. Some part of the absorption mechanism had malfunctioned and it had rendered him helpless and unable to defend himself. Goku had somehow recognised this and exploited it for all it was worth. It was laughable; a mere flaw in his design had cost him his life. He was the strongest being in the universe and yet he had been ripped to shreds and tossed back into the underworld as though he'd never left, stripped of all his dignity. The only thing he now knew for certain was that he didn't want to be here and didn't want to see his creators – or anyone else for that matter – ever again. He dreaded the onslaught of questions and insults they would throw at him, their demands to know _how_ and _why._ He could provide them with answers but the words clung to him uncomfortably as if they were stuck in his throat. He had never felt so deeply ashamed.

His defeat was not the only thing he wanted to forget. Many years ago he would have argued that he had not been programmed to feel something as useless as regret, yet the sense of something akin to it lingered about him like a thick morning fog, profound and condescending. It was everywhere, sidling up to him, resounding in his footsteps. Destroying his relationship with Android Eighteen hadn't been a part of the plan, he really hadn't expected her to throw up such an unwavering resistance towards him. Her strange behaviour could almost definitely be traced back to a certain human; Seventeen had heard her still bleating his name as his body was torn apart by their once common enemy. Yet, despite everything that had happened, despite everything she had done to him, he could not bring himself to hate her. He had never wanted to kill her, even when she'd insisted on the scenario which had given him no choice. Seventeen stopped abruptly and placed a palm against his ear. He was unsure if the ringing was getting worse or if he was growing increasingly more aware of it. Either way, it was irritating him to no end.

Hell seemed to be comprised of a darkness that his eyes could not adjust to, a darkness that hadn't been apparent before. He felt as though he were slowly suffocating. The last time he was here, the link he had been able to forge to the living world had been a breathing hole, a reassurance that something other than damnation existed. He told himself that somewhere beyond the caverns there must be some other means of escape. He had opened the gates before, he could probably find a way to do it again. Returning to the world of the living would make his death a mere temporary glitch in the grand scheme of things; Goku's victory would be reduced to something short-lived and meaningless. In any case, he knew that he could not carry out the rest of his existence in Hell.

"I had a feeling you'd end up back down here."

It would probably involve further manipulation of the dimension but that would be easy. The gates had been forced open by the synchronicity of the powers that resonated between two interconnected souls; the union of them at a place between life and death. These powers now existed within his body. Although he no longer had assistance from the living world, perhaps he could harness his powers to imitate the procedure from a single side. Perhaps only his body would be enough.

"Quite frankly, I'm at a loss for where to start."

He could sense the other residents of Hell scattered all over the place, their energy signatures akin to pinpricks of light that trembled against a vast chasm of emptiness. Some of them were isolated, others in groups, and others seemed to be dancing around each other; what he assumed was them sparring. One of them was standing directly before him and being rather irritating.

"What do you have to say for yourself?"

He hadn't been in Hell for five minutes and the questions had already started. Doctor Gero's voice seemed unnecessarily loud and every word he articulated brimmed with resentment. Seventeen knew that nothing he said in his defence would be enough to satisfy him and then began to wonder if it were possible to kill someone who was already dead. Not too far off in the distance the crux of the dimension awaited, the location where that strange crystal ball was stationed to keep Hell's prisoners partially sane. That was where he needed to get to, sooner rather than later.

"Awfully quiet, aren't you? Doctor Myuu didn't seem to be in a talkative mood either. I can't imagine why the two of you would want to avoid me."

Myuu. That name made him physically sick.

"Don't you _dare_ ignore me, Seventeen."

His patience starting to wear thin, he finally looked down and met his creator's gaze. "I have nothing to say to you."

"Well, that's a tremendous shame." Doctor Gero paused and let the odious silence draw out between them as they glared at one another. "I do hope you enjoyed betraying me again."

"I was following orders."

"Don't you give me that!" Doctor Gero hissed. "As before with your original form, you just do whatever you _want_ to do. I thought that Myuu's technology would put a stop to that but it seems that I was wrong. I watched your fight with Goku, I watched everything else that happened on earth after you turned on me. You disobeyed your orders when it suited you, didn't you? I lack the words to describe what an utter embarrassment you are."

"Good, then this conversation is over."

"We had one chance to escape this place – one! Do you know how many years I spent working on this, on _you_ , for you to waltz around and destroy it all!? You miserable, damned piece of junk!"

The doctor was visibly shaking, his hands balled into tight little fists. Seventeen recalled one occasion where he'd been this overtly infuriated, and it was just before he'd killed him the first time. Back then he'd been able to shrug all his insults off, in fact they'd almost seemed amusing. Either he'd lost some of his patience over the years or Gero had somehow managed to become even more irritating.

"I should have known better than to place my trust in you." He continued. "Even in your current form, your strength means absolutely nothing because you are far too caught up in yourself. How many of our enemies did you actually kill, Seventeen? Not a single one, and that's because you were too busy stroking your own damn ego. I told you to finish the job on more than one occasion, but did you listen? Of course you didn't, and what's worse, you _still_ have no understanding of respect or of loyalty. Worthless machine! You are nothing but a failure!"

Within the very instant that Seventeen prepared himself to deliver a venomous response, his entire body tensed reflexively and a bolt of something foreign shot through him, forcing him backwards. It curled uncomfortably around his spine and trailed down his thighs, seeped into the curves of his abdomen. All of the mechanisms within him came to an abrupt standstill. He knew exactly what Doctor Gero had done to him; his body had been subject to this kind of invasion before. Completely paralysed, he collapsed.

The emergency interrupt device. It had never occurred to him that Gero would make another one, he hadn't even thought that such a thing were possible in his current form. He watched with his peripheral vision as Gero slipped the device into his pocket and the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end as the doctor moved to fill the gap between them. He was unsure of the doctor's intentions. On previous occasions paralysis had also put him to sleep, but it seemed as though all his senses were still functioning properly. Seventeen doubted that allowing him to remain conscious was out of kindness. Lying silent and still, with his cheek pressed against the cool dirt of Hell, he found himself completely defenceless once more. Unable to do anything else, he tried to feel for the energy signatures that were dotted around and noticed that one was coming closer.

Doctor Gero knelt beside him and was silent for a while. Whatever he intended to do, he seemed to be enjoying dragging it out. "Seventeen." He began finally. "You must believe me when I tell you that I wish it hadn't come to this. You have given me no other choice." His voice seemed significantly calmer now that he had regained control of the situation. Seventeen felt his hands at his forehead, pushing his hair back out of his face. Then Gero looped a finger through his earring and as he did so his knuckle grazed his cheek. The skin on the back of his hands was soft. "I'll need to take this back."

Without hesitation, the doctor proceeded to rip his earring straight through the lobe of his ear. Seventeen wished for the mere ability to scream, no matter how strained or meek it might have been, but instead he was forced to endure this mutilation with no way of relieving his pain. It shot through him, sudden and sharp, as he heard the sound of his earring being tossed aside. He then felt the unpleasant sensation of warm blood on his neck and wondered what Gero was trying to achieve. In this situation, vulnerable and bleeding out on the floor of Hell, he realised suddenly that the deaths he had previously delivered to him had been too quick. Beneath his skin, Seventeen began to feel a tremendous fury clawing away at him, and it roared inside his head.

In the midst of his rising resentment, he suddenly began to pick up on small tremors in his immediate surroundings. It was a pleasant distraction so he focused on them and realised that they were coming from the ground. Somebody was running this way, and it seemed to be the energy signature he had singled out before. Funnily enough, three or four others were hovering close by but they were apparently content in just watching the scene unfold. What was happening to him would be merely a form of entertainment for them. The tremors slowly graduated into audible sounds; he felt Gero back away slightly and from the corner of his eye saw him turn to look over his shoulder. It seemed that he'd heard them too.

A figure finally emerged. It seemed to hesitate at Gero's presence but, after taking a moment to assess the scene, it quickly moved to stand opposite from where Seventeen lay. Though the figure was blurry, he could make out enough detail to know that this was the owner of the other angry voice he hadn't wanted to hear.

"Weren't you in the middle of running off somewhere, Myuu?"

He took a while to reply. "What's going on here?"

"Feeling a little more talkative now, are you?"

He could see that Myuu was staring down at him, his 'ultimate Machine Mutant' who was disarmed and little more than a helpless body on the floor. There was an air of shock about him and he appeared to be indulging his thoughts. He again took some time before he addressed Gero. "Will you care to enlighten me regarding what's happening here?"

"Seventeen was killed by Goku."

"That's not what I meant. What have you done to him?"

"I have deactivated him." Doctor Gero straightened up and slipped a hand into his pocket. He retrieved the controller and emphasised it with a slight wave.

"A remote power override? Why would you use that on him?"

"Traitorous cretin, I don't have to explain myself to you." Gero snapped. "The reason should be plenty obvious."

"Actually, it isn't clear to me why you've shut down the strongest being in the universe."

"You say he's the strongest being in the universe, and yet here he is." A hand suddenly grabbed at Seventeen's hair and lifted his head up from the floor. It strained his neck. "I've never been so embarrassed in all my life, to think that _this_ was the result of all my research in this place. To have been killed so quickly, so easily… Super Android Seventeen was a mistake; one that I regret heavily."

"I'm afraid I'm not following. You saw for yourself how well he performed on earth."

"It's unfortunate you weren't able to see how he died, Doctor Myuu. If you had, perhaps you would share my sentiments."

"I am of the belief that Seventeen malfunctioned. For him to become completely unresponsive, attack me and then be killed, there is no other explanation. I cannot ascertain exactly what happened without an analysis of his system, and he needs to be fully functional for such a thing to happen."

"It was no malfunction, believe me."

"Even so,"

"'Even so'? Well, I'm glad to hear that you'd make excuses for him at the cost of your own life, after all, he slaughtered you too, didn't he?" Doctor Gero laughed. "He made quite the fool of you, what with his pretending to be obedient. Well, I will not allow this to continue. A machine of this disposition needs to be destroyed."

"Destroyed? Have you completely lost your mind?"

"There is no redemption for him. He will be disassembled and his parts put to far better use."

"You can't be serious. Seventeen was a remarkable achievement; I doubt that you could ever build anything superior to him. His strength was unparalleled."

"His strength is meaningless. He is disobedient, self-obsessed and flawed to an extent that cannot be corrected. He achieved nothing on earth and I have no further use for him."

"And what if _I_ do?"

"What if you do? I am taking matters concerning him into my own hands, just as you did when you altered his programming without my knowledge. I'm sure you understand."

"This is nonsensical."

"You should know that your opinion is of no concern to me, Doctor Myuu. I heavily advise you to mind your own business."

"Do you really think I'll just stand here and let you do this?"

"Are you foolish enough to try and stop me?" Gero sneered. Apparently, Myuu had faltered at his challenge. "Yes, that's what I thought. Now then, do yourself a favour and be a good bystander, like everybody else down here, and let me get on with what I need to do."

Seventeen knew that Doctor Gero would not be convinced to abandon an idea that had simmered in his fury, his very existence was living proof of that. He had been built to avenge an army that had fallen a great number of years ago, yet in the doctor's mind it might as well have been yesterday. The wounds were still fresh, bleeding within a dimension that time's healing hands couldn't touch, and it seemed that the recent events on earth had impacted him more than Seventeen had realised. The doctor had already put his mind to seeing this through to the end.

Careless hands were grabbing at him again. This time they went for his shoulders and waist, and in a few forceful movements he had been turned over onto his back. Unable to focus his eyes, he stared up blankly at nothing. Doctor Gero seized him by the hair and yanked his head back, exposing his neck. He was treating him like an inanimate object. Didn't he realise that he was still conscious?

"Stop this!" Myuu rushed forward and took hold of Gero's arm. Seventeen felt the rush of air from Gero's instant reaction over his face and saw Myuu stumble backwards.

Gero stood up. "Would you like to be taken apart as well, Doctor Myuu? Because that is exactly what will be happening if you dare to interfere again."

"I'm not going to let you do this."

"Who do you think you are? There is nothing that someone with your kind of power, or lack thereof, can do. Don't be insistent on being a pest. Ending your existence will be all too easy for me."

Myuu got to his feet but refrained from responding. At this point he was probably looking for the nearest exit, the fact he'd bothered to defend him at all was astounding.

"I am very rapidly running out of patience with you _._ Just keep out of this."

Seventeen felt a minute tremor shudder through the ground. Was someone else going to intervene? Would anybody else in Hell _care_?

At around the same time that Doctor Gero began to wonder how much energy he had left to burn on a physical confrontation, Doctor Myuu began to wonder what he had left to lose. It had been a long time since either of them had needed to put up a fight by themselves. Gero's last battle had taken place shortly after Android Nineteen had been destroyed, and Myuu hadn't engaged his powers since the invasion of planet M2, an incredibly risky ordeal that his research had depended on. With the older Machine Mutants being so limited in their numbers and his General being unable to transform, he'd been given no other choice but to partake in the war effort then. After a narrow victory, he'd decided it would be best to retire gracefully from the frontline and appoint someone else as the army's leader. He knew his strength was not his greatest asset, and whilst his lack of self-confidence was quite obvious, Doctor Gero was determined to put up a very convincing front.

Myuu glanced down at his creation. Sprawled out in the dirt like a limp doll was his finest work, a machine that he and Gero both had put their souls into crafting and perfecting. Such a creation was irreplaceable, and it was also the only thing he had left now. No matter what had happened on earth, Seventeen didn't deserve the fate that Gero was intending to give him; it was saddening enough that he was in Hell to begin with. The doctor knew that the process of gathering what power he had would hurt, and, being unable to sense Gero's energy, he didn't even know if it would be worth it. With doubt and uncertainty at the forefront of his mind, he took a few steps back and prepared himself for an encounter he wished with all his might he could avoid.

Doctor Gero quietly hoped that his verbal efforts would be enough to deter Myuu from attempting to intervene again. Since he had only started observing him after his running into Goku, he had no idea how capable he was in battle. Even if he posed no real threat, which was most likely the case, he didn't want to waste the time and energy that would be required in dealing with him. He was not at his maximum capacity and this had the potential to become an immense problem. He was unsure if the opportunity would arise for him to replenish his energy, and if it didn't, he would be at a severe disadvantage. Although making Myuu pay dearly for his betrayal was quite high up on his list of things to do, he would much prefer to leave such a job to his next project. He had all of eternity to suffer, after all. However, it looked as though Myuu had recognised the futility in opposing him and decided to back off, so he returned his attention to Seventeen. As he knelt beside him once more, his reassurance was shattered by the low growl that was coming from Myuu's throat.

For a while, nothing seemed to be happening. The growl became gradually louder and more strained until it morphed into full on shriek, and together with the pose he had assumed it might have been impressive if only his body had responded. Gero watched him with continued interest and mused upon attacking him whilst his defences were down. Catching him off guard before he could gather his strength would be one way to end the conflict quickly. Simultaneously, he wanted to let Myuu humiliate himself for his own sheer amusement. It was this desire that won him over and kept him rooted beside Seventeen.

As his body trembled, Myuu could already feel his actions taking his toll on him. The echoes of his cries, which were now arising from a pained throat, were bouncing around the caverns and making his voice sound stronger than it really was. His head felt as though it were splitting. As he pushed through the amounting pressure, he felt something within himself beginning to give. Pulses of energy were starting to escape from him and a brief look at Gero's expression confirmed that he wasn't imagining it. As he reached into the dormant corners of his circuits, he took a sharp in-breath, threw his head back and put everything he had into drawing his strength, screaming so loud in the process that he was sure he'd torn his larynx. As a mauve glow erupted around his form he felt the incredible rush of his body awakening in his ears. There was a sudden surge in his energy; it was erratic and unsettled, difficult to contain, and it danced across his skin like electricity. It felt the same as it had done many years ago. Momentarily he stood stationary from the shock of what had just happened. He tried to catch his breath, already becoming aware of the fatigue he knew would only get worse.

"Is that Tsuffle energy, Myuu? How very interesting. Unfortunately for you, however, it seems the act of summoning your pathetic powers has already worn you out." Recognising that his opposition was very serious in trying to meddle with his plans, Doctor Gero stood up and moved away from the idle machine on the floor. "You have made a terrible mistake, indeed." He said flatly. Apparently, an eternity of regret would start from today.

Myuu recognised that he couldn't waste any time making snide remarks. "Here!" He shouted as he removed his headpiece and pelted it at Gero, who ducked just in time to feel it tear his own hat from his head. Gero watched over his shoulder as their apparel flew into one of the nearby caverns, shattering it on impact. The abruptness of it all had made him drop his guard, and as he turned back he paid the price for such an error. He was struck fiercely in the face, and it was enough to propel him backwards into the air. Hearing Myuu skidding and pushing off from the ground was enough to make him right himself, and as he did so he noted with exasperation that Myuu was a cheater as much as he was a liar and a thief. Within moments they were engaged in a form of hand-to-hand combat that took them high above the caverns. It seemed that Myuu had the strength to keep up with him, however, after avoiding several of his attacks, Gero noted that he was rather lacking in agility. It didn't take him long to find an opportunity to strike, and when it presented itself he took it at full force, sending Myuu crashing back into the craggy outgrowths below.

Somewhat disconcerted, but more irritated than anything else, Gero waited for his opponent's reappearance. "You don't stand a chance against me, Myuu!" He shouted into the darkness as the dust settled. He felt himself trembling; his unused muscles were sparking into life. He reminded himself that he had constructed his body to overpower Goku many years ago, though it seemed that he had been idle in Hell and unable to fulfil his original purpose for far too long. He allowed himself a brief glance at Seventeen and was thankful to be spared the sight of his eyes.

After musing upon a slight change of strategy (he did not need to win this fight, he merely needed to obtain the controller), Myuu shot out of the debris and met with Gero in the air once more. As they exchanged strike after strike, he became acutely aware of how uncoordinated he was in comparison to his adversary. Doctor Gero was an incredibly fast mover and he recovered from missed hits quickly whilst Myuu found himself struggling. It made evasion a chore, so he tried to remain on the offensive but landing a hit almost seemed impossible. Then he saw a small window: Gero reeled back to strike but took a moment longer than usual to deliver. It gave Myuu just enough time to snake around it and retaliate with a sharp blow to his abdomen.

It hurt more than it should have. As Gero slumped over and drew his knees in towards himself, he glared up at Myuu. "Stop this nonsense!"

"Give me the controller."

"That machine is defective and it needs to be shut down." He had barely finished his sentence when he suffered another strike to the face. It invoked the resumption of their fight, and it also made him terribly aware of the fact that he could not sustain this kind of performance for much longer.

It seemed as though Gero was beginning to tire; his movements were gradually becoming slacker and less refined. He started making more mistakes which were slight but just enough to leave him open, and consequently Myuu began to land his punches more frequently. He knew that he was also becoming weary and that he would eventually join Gero in losing his strength, however, for now it seemed he had the slight upper hand. As he considered when might be the best time to try for the controller, multiple thin shafts of energy shot out of nowhere and struck his shoulder. He yelped and withdrew, one hand instinctively flying up to cover the wound. It was burning, as though whatever hit him had been searing hot. He looked up and studied Gero; he definitely hadn't used a regular ki blast with his hands.

Gero knew that the lasers he could fire from his eyes would consume far too much energy for him to use them haphazardly, as he had done back in South City, but they had been successful in disengaging Myuu. He now needed to make the most of his being off-guard. Before Myuu could raise his defences, he surged towards him at full force and slammed his fist directly between his eyes. He was rewarded with the very satisfying sight of his glasses shattering upon impact, with tiny shards flying about them to bestrew the floor below. Myuu recoiled and impulsively threw his hands up to his face. Arms shaking, Gero delivered a lethal blow to his back which sent him tumbling back down to the ground.

He descended neatly next to the small crater that had formed from Myuu's landing. Perhaps this would be enough to make him give up. The most efficient option would have been to simply destroy the controller, however, it was far safer to keep hold of it. He absolutely couldn't risk Seventeen being reactivated. That being said, his energy was beginning to reach a critical level.

"Did you need those glasses, Myuu? I certainly hope not. How terrible it would be for you to be blind." He watched as Myuu struggled to his feet and rubbed at the remaining shards around his eyes.

"No need for concern, I can see just fine without them."

"You know, it saddens me that it has come to this. I held you and your technology in such high regard. If it weren't for your deceit we would have both owned the earth by now."

"I've no doubt that you would have done the same thing to me somewhere down the line. Anyway, Seventeen could never have fulfilled his true potential under your command."

Doctor Gero smirked. "If you call what happened on earth his 'true potential' then perhaps you should have retired already."

"And if _you_ need an emergency override to control your creations then perhaps artificial intelligence was never your field to begin with."

His smirk faded. "Do you intend to continue to oppose me?"

"My intentions will change when yours do, Doctor Gero."

"Very well."

Myuu was then staring at the rapidly fading form of Gero's afterimage. At a speed that was entirely beyond what he could process, he was pushed onto his back and one of his arms pinned down above his head. Gero's other hand was clamped around his neck, and an unnerving warmth was spreading in his palm as he forced his head back into the dirt. Though his grip was painfully tight, it seemed that his intention wasn't to strangle him to death. He didn't want to wait to find out what was really going on. With his one free hand, Myuu attempted to pry Gero off him.

The sight of two old men grappling with each other in the dirt might have been amusing to the onlookers in Hell. It might have been amusing to Seventeen had his life not depended on it. Gero was not able to get a perfect grasp on Myuu; no matter how he tried to restrain him, he thrashed and wriggled enough to get loose. Eventually, Myuu managed to free one of his legs and used it to grind his foot painfully into one of Gero's hips, pushing away his lower body as they wrestled with one another. Though he was beginning to believe that the struggle was pointless, Gero moved to try and force the stray leg back into place, and he unintentionally loosened his grip on Myuu's wrists as he did so. Myuu responded immediately, yanking his arms away and viciously hitting him in the jaw. He was sent backwards with a searing pain in the side of his face, but he was more concerned with the fact that his defences were falling fast and that Myuu's strikes would be increasingly detrimental to him.

Slightly flustered, Myuu got to his feet. The fatigue that accompanied being in this state was beginning to take its toll on him. With tired eyes he saw that Gero had recovered and was standing motionless in the distance, his figure ghostly and sinister, inviting him to make the next move. Though he felt he was playing right into his hands, Myuu braced himself and started towards him. To his surprise, Gero made no effort to fight him and instead retreated further away.

"Are you giving up?" Myuu called out. His question received no answer and so for a while he stood idly in confused silence, with Gero remaining equally passive. He finally decided he would try and engage Gero in combat again, but his attempt was met with the same response: Gero fled but remained in the near vicinity. His speed was such that he could just continuously avoid him and they'd end up running around in circles, getting nowhere.

As Gero glared at him from afar, Myuu was struck with a sudden realisation. From what he had told him, Gero was part of the generation of androids he had developed before he'd invested in more advanced models with infinite energy supplies. As such, it was almost certain that he was an energy absorbing model as Seventeen was but powered by a limited supply that needed to be replenished. Of course, he could have developed some other method to restore himself, but the sacrificed energy of others was the quick and dirty path that Myuu knew all too well. He smiled to himself. After developing Seventeen, he would never make the mistake of using ki blasts against a machine.

In order to test the water, he drifted close enough to Gero to see him a little clearer, and he appeared to be readying himself to flee again. Though he knew it would drain him, Myuu formed small ki blasts in his open palms and analysed Gero's response. His movements were subtle but they were enough to expose him, especially on his face: it seemed as though he was on the verge of desperation and, without a doubt, he was trying to maintain a large distance between the two of them so that Myuu would resort to using energy attacks.

Myuu weighed up how to proceed in his mind. Physically reaching Gero was impossible (he would most likely tire from chasing him before Gero tired from retreating) and using energy attacks was out of the question. Perhaps Gero was pushing for a stalemate in which neither of them could do anything; such an outcome would not entirely count as a loss to him as Seventeen would remain deactivated. Myuu realised that he had been pushed into an unpleasant corner. There was only one thing he could think of that was worth trying, however, if it didn't take Gero out, he would lose this fight. He wondered if it was worth the risk, he was already near the cusp of exhaustion and pulling this attack off would force him to use what energy he had left. However, Gero appeared to be in a worse state than him and he would almost certainly be caught off-guard, no doubt he'd never witnessed anything like his _Psychic Bomber_ before.

He'd practiced this attack routinely in the past, even when he'd had no intention of using it, to ensure that he would never forget how to perform it. He raised one hand up and formed a spherical object in his palm, savouring the instant rush it gave him and the clear flicker of uncertain interest it generated in Gero's eyes. Gritting his teeth, he prepared himself for what was about to happen and the pain that he would most assuredly feel afterwards as a result.

The purple haze surrounding the sphere in his palm expanded outwards. He clenched his free hand into a tight fist and the sphere mutated, exploding into a bright ball of light. Fixated on what was taking place in Myuu's hand, Gero realised too late that he had been surrounded by an external energy field. He attempted to move from it but it held him fixed in place, as though he had been locked into another dimension. In a swift blur of colours that were rarely found in Hell, the energy field closed in on him before he'd had the chance to work out what was happening to him, and he found himself caught up in a tremendous explosion which had seemingly been generated by his own body, forcing him into the centre of it all with no escape.

For a few seconds, Hell was a very bright place. The delivery of such a strenuous attack had rendered Myuu completely enervated and he found himself unable to maintain a state of elevated power any longer; even the backdraught was enough to make him feel unsteady. The gentle light of his aura grew dim as he powered down, and after it had died away he dropped to his knees. Already, a biting pain was beginning to seep into his joints; such was the unfortunate drawback to using his Tsuffle powers. He anxiously watched for movement as the dust settled, uncertain that what he'd done was enough. Then he erupted into laughter when he saw that Gero had collapsed. Wincing, he slowly crawled over to the doctor and rummaged in one of his pockets. He was still very much alive and conscious, his face portraying a fury that agonised him to the depths of his soul, but he was unable to move. Myuu retrieved the controller and crumpled onto the floor beside him. His arms ached to the point where even pressing the switch was a challenge.

The two of them lay quietly until Gero felt he could give his anger a fitting voice. "If I'd had a little more energy, annihilating you would have been all too easy for me."

"Well," Myuu replied weakly. "You won't be annihilating Seventeen regardless of how much energy you have."

"He was nothing…" Gero clawed at the dirt, trying to lift himself from the floor. "…but a mistake." Only giving himself access to a limited supply of energy had also been a mistake, but when he had made the decision many years ago he hadn't realised that it would be so detrimental to him. Things were supposed to have been so much simpler.

As Gero struggled to get up, Myuu noted that he couldn't hear any other forms of movement. He turned his head. Seventeen was a little way off and he was unable to see him clearly, but he most certainly should have woken up by now. His mind began to flood with worried thoughts; what was the limit on the range of the remote? Had it been broken somehow?

"That controller doesn't belong to you." Gero said bitterly. "Give it back to me."

He clutched it to his chest. "Never. You'll break off both my arms and then some if you want this back."

The sight of Gero on all fours with a determined air about him was incredibly unnerving. He began to drag himself along the floor; there was an insatiable anger in his bloodstream and it seemed to give him strength. Myuu heaved himself up onto one elbow and instantly felt the consequences tearing through him like a wildfire, every muscle in his body begging him to stop. Though he tried with what little energy he had left, Myuu was unable to move from where he had earlier collapsed. Then he felt Gero grab hold of his ankle and begin to pull. Impulsively, he lobbed the controller as far as he could.

"How cowardly. Didn't feel like having your limbs ripped off after all, did you?" He tightened his grip around Myuu's ankle as much as he could and relished the cry of agony it won him. "No matter. It will take me some time, but I will still get to it." In that instant, someone landed gracefully beside him, and he didn't need to look upon the figure to identify who it was. He cursed everything that existed within Hell.

Myuu strained to look over his shoulder. " _Seventeen!_ " He felt relief to the point where he could have cried. He'd almost forgotten how tall he was; he towered over them both and stared down silently, long hair pushed back from his face. He didn't look happy.

"Do as you wish!" Gero snarled, anticipating that his creation would quickly become violent. "What good do you think attacking me will do in Hell? We are all immortal here! And I will shut you down regardless of what you do to me now!"

He'd felt the current flowing back into his hands first, fingertips twitching in their limited mobility. Reactivation had never happened like this before. It swept over him like the warmth of a rising sun, boldly chasing away the chill of the early morning shadows. His upper body had followed suit quickly and within moments he had been able to sit up. Though he had been conscious the entire time, it felt as though he'd just woken up from a long nap. He was groggy and somnolent. His legs had taken a little longer to find their strength and so standing up had involved stumbling several times. Though he felt fine now, he remained wary that some other aspect of him hadn't been reactivated properly.

Seventeen wondered what to do with the two doctors. The two of them were staring up at him expectantly, waiting for him to say something. He'd heard what had happened between them and seen aspects of their fight from the corners of his eyes. He knew he needed to intervene but if Doctor Gero was telling the truth, if people really were immortal in Hell, then it seemed that there wasn't a great deal he could do. The best course of action was simply to disarm the threat for now, even if it would come back just as angry and just as eager to shred him to pieces.

He bent down, grabbed a handful of Gero's hair and pulled him up with it, letting him dangle aimlessly. The doctor made no attempt to put up any kind of resistance, merely glared at him with his powder blue eyes, burning the last of his energy on seething with hatred.

"Do it, damned machine." He invited with a low, strained voice. "See what happens."

Seventeen quietly wished he hadn't needed to waste his time. He had decided that Doctor Gero's next death would not be quick and freeing; he would feel what it was to suffer in the process. He grabbed him by the throat with his spare hand and felt him instantly go rigid, but still he made no effort to fight back. In one quick movement he'd cut his throat with his fingers alone and tossed him back to the ground. It was tremendously unsatisfying. Lacking the energy to move, Gero looked up at him silently with something akin to shock plastered on his face. Although he was somewhat curious as to how long it would take him to fade away from existence, Seventeen didn't intend to stick around long enough to find out.

"I'm glad you're okay. I was worried the device had been broken."

He looked over at Myuu, who was still crumpled up on the floor. He had been injured; the dark glasses that normally covered his eyes were gone and his shoulder was bleeding quite heavily. Looking at him made Seventeen recall his last moments on earth and he felt an unwelcome twinge of something he'd rather ignore. He averted his gaze. The damage had been done.

"I appreciate the help." He told him flatly, and with that he turned to walk away.

"Seventeen, wait. We need to talk."

"I think it's best that we don't."

"Please."

Seventeen gazed over at where the dimension thinned out into a soft blanket of cloud. If it weren't for Gero he probably would have escaped by now, and he wouldn't have had to deal with this. He felt himself tense up involuntarily. The sensation of suffocation was beginning to intensify.

"Can you walk?"

"I can try."

Seventeen watched as Myuu struggled to his knees and resolutely ignored the voice that told him to help. During each feeble attempt he made at standing, his legs would eventually give in and he'd end up back on the floor. After several failed attempts, Seventeen's impatience got the better of him. He grabbed him roughly by the belt around his waist and flew off with him, taking them both out of Gero's hearing range and closer to where he actually wanted to be.

He set the doctor down and turned away from him, unwilling to give him anything more than the side of his face. Immediately, he noticed that the ringing in his ears had been aggravated. It was beginning to sound as though it were coming from somewhere nearby, and there seemed to be a strange, elevated pressure complementing it. Something had changed within the dimension itself. Well, at least it wasn't originating from inside his own head.

"I, I really didn't expect to see you here." Myuu began with an air of uncertainty. "I passed Doctor Gero lurking around earlier and thought nothing of it, he didn't tell me you'd..." He paused. "Hey, what happened to your ear?"

His irritation surged. "Gero ripped my earring out."

"Why?"

"I don't know, does he need a reason? He harped on about needing it back or something. Who cares."

"I can stitch it for you."

"Don't bother." He replied abruptly. The last thing he wanted was someone making a fuss over his wounds.

"Seventeen… what are you doing here? What happened with Goku?"

Finally, there it was, but the question hadn't been asked with the resentment he'd expected. There was something else present in Myuu's voice, perhaps sorrow or disappointment or both. He almost wished Myuu would just be angry so that they could get into another argument and he could just walk away.

"There's a flaw in my energy absorption mechanism."

"A 'flaw'? What do you mean?"

"I don't know exactly but it leaves me open to attack in some situations. It paralyses me."

"Temporary paralysis is necessary to prevent your body from being overloaded."

"It wasn't temporary when I was absorbing multiple attacks. There was nothing I could do to defend myself and Goku took full advantage of it."

Myuu was quiet for a moment. "I'm not entirely sure what you're describing, but I'm sure that it wouldn't have been an issue if you'd have just killed them."

That was it, that was all he needed to explode into a rage. "Well, of course you blame _me_ for all the mistakes you made. What did I expect? Your head is too far up your own ass for you to listen to what I'm saying. You just can't accept responsibility for your actions, can you? You know what, I'm astounded that you have the audacity to even approach me after the way you spoke to me on earth. You're exactly like Doctor Gero! The two of you wretched old fools deserve the same fate, I should rip your throat out too and throw you on top of him! How'd you like the sound of that!?"

"H-How, how dare you threaten me! I just risked my soul trying to save you!" Myuu was attempting to stand again. "But whilst we're on the subject, why exactly _did_ you attack me before!?"

" _Because you were supposed to be on my side!_ " He shouted. It wasn't an answer he'd thought through and he hadn't expected his voice to carry so much anger in it. His sudden outburst almost shocked him as much as it had shocked Myuu.

"What are you talking about?"

"You know exactly what I'm talking about, or did you already forget the way you insulted me like I was worth nothing to you? I did everything you asked of me, I even put up with Gero for the sake of your stupid guise! The nerve of you to turn around and belittle me!" He paused. "You care _nothing_ for me." The words stung as they left his lips, as if they should only have existed within the comforts of his mind. He regretted saying them instantly.

"I was angry with you for being so irrational. It made no sense for you to fear something as insignificant as an explosive device."

"I told you before that I wasn't frightened!"

"Then explain to me why you refused to attack. You were fine until that woman showed up and started threatening you with her explosives."

Seventeen averted his eyes. He could have written a very long list of all the things he'd rather do than have this conversation. Talking about Eighteen made him feel terribly uneasy. "I assume that you know who she was."

"Android Eighteen. Doctor Gero talked about her very briefly, I believe she was another android in the same generation as the original Android Seventeen. So, what exactly did she have against you?"

"She's my twin sister, not just another android."

"But she said that you'd attacked her before."

"I never intended to kill her. I wanted to spare her."

Something flickered in Myuu's eyes. "Are you trying to tell me that you held back because you still care about her?"

Seventeen said nothing. Somehow Myuu had very quickly managed to drain all his fury into shame. He found himself feeling the way he had when he'd first arrived in Hell. Caring for his sibling, his only blood relation who had suffered with him throughout Gero's torture, was apparently a luxury very far out of his reach. He knew that his trying to grasp at it could only be considered an embarrassment.

"Well, how unexpectedly mawkish of you." He was finally standing upright, glaring up at him. "It's also rather unfortunate, because Android Eighteen didn't feel the same way about you, did she? From what you've told me it seems that she played a rather significant part in your death, is that right?"

"Yes."

"Then perhaps you should consider that she doesn't quite care for you the way you care for her. If she did, you would still be alive."

Something jarring and uncomfortable stirred within him. He could feel it in his eyes and in his throat, heavy and sharp and sardonic. It made him want to scream. Perhaps he _was_ pathetic.

"I can't believe this." Myuu continued to chide. "How exactly did you intend to destroy the earth with her still on it?"

"Like I said, I wanted to spare her. I tried to get her to join us."

He was shaking his head now. "Doctor Gero told me that he had struggled to eradicate your emotions during your initial restructuring process. Perhaps I should give it a shot. I'm sure I could also fix the error in your system that you claim to have."

"What, you want to pretend you're in my corner again? Aren't you forgetting how cowardly and pathetic I am?"

Myuu folded his arms. "My previous judgements were formed from an incorrect assumption. In light of this conversation I think I'll call you melodramatic and reckless instead."

"An apology is just too much to ask from you, isn't it?"

"It was never my intention to offend you."

"Yeah, I figured."

"Super Android Seventeen." He began firmly. "Do you really want to kick up such a fuss about one flippant comment I made? What about all the praise I gave you? I meant every word I said, and whether you want to believe it or not I _do_ care about you. After Goku had blown himself up I thought I'd lost you; do you honestly think that I felt nothing?" He paused briefly but the question had apparently been rhetorical. "We were so close, Goku was nothing in comparison to you. You alone could have done it and I believed that you would, I believed in you with everything I had. We'd have been making plans to own the entire galaxy by now, but instead we're here, caged into a void that owns _us_. Don't you understand my frustration?"

"Don't you understand mine? It's not like I wanted to just sit there doing nothing. I felt like a total idiot and you insulting me only made it worse."

"You cannot justify attacking me because you disliked something I said."

"Don't you dare, don't you _dare_ downplay it like that! I trustedyou, I never thought you'd be so callous towards me. You betrayed me."

"I didn't betray you, don't be so dramatic."

"I'm notbeing dramatic!" There was no way he was going to roll over and accept defeat. "I didn't know what to do when Eighteen showed up. I needed you to support me, but you didn't even consider that, did you? You humiliated me for nothing, and what's more I died because of the flaw in my system - the system that was developed by _you_. Not only did you betray me but you also gave me a defective enhancement, yet here you are trying to excuse yourself. We're both here now because of you, not me."

Myuu looked away as if he were suddenly recalling some long-lost memory. "Your energy absorption enhancement was my innovation and it was designed not only to protect you but also to make you stronger. If what you've told me is true then it seems that aspects of it could be exploited and this ultimately led to your death. Such a serious defect should not have been overlooked." His voice softened. "I'm sorry, Seventeen. I don't know how this happened. I never wanted this kind of fate for you." His voice trailed off into silence and just like that, the conversation that Seventeen had dreaded came to an end.

It had happened all too quickly and Seventeen was unsure if he'd really heard that apology or if he'd just imagined it. It was something he hadn't expected, something he would never have received from Gero. Regardless, it seemed that Myuu had said everything he'd needed to, and now he was just staring wistfully off into the darkness, looking at nothing in particular and lost in his own thoughts. He looked somewhat sad. Seventeen noticed then that he was keeping his weight on one foot. He really hadn't left that fight unscathed.

He wasn't sure what to say now. Within the past five minutes he'd sampled every possible emotion on the spectrum and he was now thoroughly tired of talking. He hadn't really been given an explanation that he was satisfied with – running with _I was angry_ wasn't even an admirable evasion of responsibility - but at least Myuu had admitted that he'd been at fault.

Seventeen knelt beside him. "Hey, I never wanted this either. I guess I just lost my cool. I guess we both did. I never wanted to kill you; conquering the galaxy alone would be boring."

"Well, such a thing is no longer possible. We are both stuck here forever." The doctor turned back to him and studied his face now that he could see it clearly. Seventeen wondered what he looked like; probably an insipid combination of weary and irritated. "Your ear is still bleeding. I really should clean it."

Seventeen took a moment to study him too. It was the first time he'd seen his eyes. For a short while they stared at each other as if they'd never seen each other before. "I'm fine. You should think about your own injuries."

"Doctor Gero wasn't able to hit very hard. His greatest strength was his speed."

"He smacked those glasses right off your face, though, didn't he?" His comment had meant to sound somewhat light-hearted as opposed to derisive but, from the look he'd been given, it seemed as though it hadn't amused his creator. Nevertheless, after everything he'd been through, he felt he deserved a few free jabs. "Talk down to me ever again and I'll smack them right back on you."

"Stop threatening me. You've made your point."

"Relax, I'm just teasing you." He said untruthfully, his voice sounding lighter than he'd meant it to. He told himself in quiet malice that another bout of disrespect would result in more than just shattered glasses. "Doctor, I've been wanting to ask you something. Can you hear that?"

"Hear what?"

"A really irritating high-pitched ringing noise."

Myuu listened for a moment. "I can't hear anything."

"It started as soon as I got here so I don't think it's just me, it has to be coming from somewhere specifically in this place. I can also sense a pressure building and I'm starting to think the two are related. It's hard to explain but it's as if there are traces of the living word here, like there's a small rip in the fabric of this dimension, or something. Whoever established a link between Hell and earth the last time didn't seal it properly."

"Sounds ominous."

"Maybe not. If it's what I think it is, then I'll bet I can get us out of here."

"I'm afraid that's impossible."

"No, it's isn't." He countered sternly. On this occasion he felt that arguing with a scientist who undoubtedly knew more than him was justifiable.

Myuu gave him a tired look. "The link was only established to begin with because of the harmonised powers that resonated between the original Seventeen of this world and that of earth. We have no way to replicate that now."

"I _am_ those powers."

"Yes, but you exist in a single dimension. We no longer have any contact with the living world."

"I'm telling you," he insisted, "I can open the gates from this side."

"I don't see how. According to Gero's theory-"

"According to _Gero's_ theory." Seventeen mocked. "Go ahead and believe whatever you want. I will open the gates and I'll do it unassisted. You can sit here and form prayer circles with the damned if you like but I'm _out._ "

"Well, I'm not sure what you're planning to do but try to do it as discretely as possible. I think we've drawn enough attention to ourselves as it is, and if you _do_ somehow manage to pull this off I'd like to avoid being detected by our little friends on earth. The bug in your system needs to be rectified before we even think about attempting another attack."

"Fine."

It seemed that Myuu was already making plans that had far overtaken his own thoughts. He hadn't even considered going straight back into battle, as much as he'd love to give that smug little Saiyan a taste of his own medicine. There was a large phantom wound in his abdomen and it was going to take a long damn time to heal.

Doctor Myuu turned and started limping back in Gero's direction. Seventeen followed him with his eyes, curious as to where he was heading. After his small figure was near eclipsed by the murky fog of the dimension, which gathered about the place like cobwebs, Seventeen was struck by the harrowing realisation that he had forgotten about the controller. How he'd managed _that_ was beyond him, but, neither he nor Myuu had destroyed it, which meant that Gero would be able to deactivate him again if he 'died' and returned in a short enough time span. Then his mind crept into a territory equally as unsettling: had Myuu actually gone back to destroy it, or did he intend to keep it instead? He supposed that being killed might cause a person to up their guard a little, yet it somehow still felt insulting. Or, perhaps he had some other unknown intention. Perhaps he'd forgotten about it too and was just checking on Gero.

There was no point in standing around and entertaining thoughts that achieved nothing. Seventeen headed over to the area where he'd opened the gates the first time, landing neatly beside the omniscient crystal that was used to spy upon the living on earth. Nobody was bothering with it today. Nobody other than the two doctors had bothered with it the last time he was here. Perhaps nobody here cared about the living anymore. He peered down at the inky clouds below, huddled together like an ocean of softness that didn't quite belong in this dimension. He confirmed to himself that the noise was coming from somewhere nearby where the link had been established the first time, which was reassuring at least. He had no evidence to prove it, but he was almost certain that somebody who hadn't quite known what they were doing had messed around with the gates to set Goku free. But, who in _Hell_ would do that for him? How was it possible that he had contacts here?

He looked over his shoulder and saw Myuu's hazy silhouette crouching over something. He couldn't quite make out what he was doing but it seemed as though he'd picked something up. He watched as Myuu struggled to get back to his feet and then started limping back. When he was a little closer and out of the clutches of the mist, Seventeen instinctively looked down and studied his hands. They were empty, which meant that he'd either pocketed the remote or left it there. They made eye contact and Seventeen half expected him to offer some sort of explanation, but instead he hobbled over to where the crystal was set and slumped down with his back against it. He looked exhausted and also more interested in the floor than in what Seventeen was doing. Though he was irked, he decided to avoid further conflict and refrained from asking questions; if Myuu wasn't holding onto the controller then he had no immediate intention of using it, and there were far more important things to be thinking about presently.

Although the tear in the dimension was causing noticeable changes in the atmosphere – noticeable to him at least - there were no visible signs of it. He descended into the indigo mass below to investigate precisely where it was, and he found that being in such close proximity to it became quite painful after a while. He wandered around with gritted teeth, the noise now more akin to an ethereal screaming in his head. After gathering a rough idea of its whereabouts, he returned to nearby where Myuu was sitting and mused upon how exactly he should exploit it. Originally, the rift had been opened by the union of his powers from two different dimensions, but if the rift already existed to some degree then perhaps all it would take was sending his energy straight into it. Since the tear was so minute, the tricky part would be targeting the precise location. Nevertheless, precision was something machines never needed to worry about, especially one as advanced as himself.

The job would require a little concentration. He closed his eyes and felt the energy signatures around him like spatters of rain. He noticed that one of them was very nearly extinguished. Apparently, Gero was still very much present within the dimension. If he listened hard enough he could hear Hell's gentle heartbeat; muffled conversations, distant footsteps, a faint breeze, laughter. He felt every movement in the air like calloused hands on the back of his neck and heard Myuu breathing as though he were right beside his ear. Throughout all of these sensations the rift screeched on and on relentlessly and it made him want nothing more than to shrink away from it, retreat all the way back to the other side of Hell, if such a thing were reachable. Nevertheless, he met this discomfort with a brave face and, after tracing the vibrations back to their source, he allowed himself to feel a little relief at having found the site. What he could sense was remarkable and wildly confusing; the matter of the living realm had somehow gotten caught up inside the rift. It seemed fluid, contorted, and it pulsed as if it were alive.

Caring little for the specifics of what had happened to cause this strange anomaly, he powered up and projected a thin spoke of his energy forth into the clouds. It made contact with the matter of the living world and, almost instantaneously, he felt the connection between the two realms manifesting as a part of his body. They merged together within him smoothly, effortlessly, as though the link between them was magnetic and Hell's gates being open was merely the natural order of the universe. It was as exhilarating as it had been the first time he'd undergone this process, although going through it solo made it that much more overwhelming. In this moment, the entirety of Hell's power was his to possess alone, and its gentle heartbeat had morphed into a crashing thunder that augmented his strength. He threw his head back. The hardest part was staying in control of it all. The rift wanted to expand maximally around his power, however, he reminded himself that a person-sized tunnel would be enough this time. A clump of cloud slowly began to part, and, in no time at all, there it was: an uninviting black hole that served as his newly formed exit to earth.

He took a few moments to look over his work and keep the power of Hell contained and buzzing within him. The ordeal had been suspiciously easy; he had expected it to work but not _quite_ that well. Perhaps he'd tumble into it and end up someplace other than earth, someplace sharper and colder. He pushed these thoughts aside and went to call the doctor over but Myuu hadn't needed an invitation, he was already standing beside him and staring down at the little tunnel with him, the both of them admiring it like a framed piece of art.

"This is astonishing," he said finally. "I don't understand how this could be possible!"

Seventeen knew he would never be able to explain the mechanics behind it all so he didn't bother trying. It didn't really matter, anyway. "So much for the void owning us. Go on ahead, I'll follow."

"I don't have the strength to fly."

He sighed. This was becoming tedious quickly. "Stand in front of me."

Myuu did as he was asked and looked up at him with defiance in his eyes. "Don't carry me like you did before. It's uncomfortable."

"You're lucky I'll carry you at all. Maybe I should throw you down instead."

Before he had the chance to say anything, Seventeen hoisted him up and let him throw an arm around his shoulder. He knew that movement would impact his ability to hold the rift open, so he pushed off from the ground and swiftly fell into it. As he descended, the stagnant, bleak atmosphere of Hell lost its grip on him. A rush of warm air hit him and he expected the accompanying sudden influx of light, however, the darkness seemed to extend for longer than it had done before. They emerged into the living world gently and silently, and still in darkness. After the gates closed behind him and the icy remnants of Hell's power drained from his body, Seventeen looked about himself. The sky was laden with thousands of stars, and directly overhead the core of the milky way shone brightly in all its galactic brilliance, offering those on earth a small insight into interstellar grandeurs. The air was heavy and still, as though a storm might be on the way, and there was the sound of crashing waves in the distance. They were drifting above an ocean. This wasn't where the link had been established before – was this Goku's doing?

"Incredible." Myuu murmured. He was still looking up at where the rift had been. "You're incredible."

Seventeen said nothing. His attention was being drawn to a small island below them that seemed to boast an abundance of life, active even in the stillness of the night. There was something peculiar about it, something quietly captivating. He wondered what it was.

"Seventeen, I'd like to examine the defect in your system. The best way to do that would be to head back to my lab, but it's some way across the galaxy. I could probably put together a ship to get us there but I'm not sure how long it would take me using earth's resources."

"Alternatively, I could just fly us there. I suppose instant translocation would be a more efficient way of getting the job done but I don't know how to pull that off."

"Whilst I'm aware that you are able to function as normal in space, I can't really assume the same for myself, especially when it comes to things like breaking through the atmosphere."

"I'll throw up a shield. If you're next to me then it'll protect you too."

"Are you sure?"

"Hey, you doubted me about opening the rift and look what happened. Where is your lab, exactly?" In consideration of navigating through their galaxy, Seventeen realised that he already owned a detailed map which described a multitude of planets in his memory. Despite this wealth of information that few would be privy to, the island retained his fervent interest.

"It's on planet LR-ANN, nearby M2."

"Yeah, it shouldn't take more than a few hours to get there."

"I'm not sure how you're reaching that approximation." Myuu paused. "What are you looking at?"

"Nothing, just that island. Nature can be so stunning."

"What?"

"Anyway, this planet is trash. Let's get out of here and eradicate it upon our return."


	2. Memories I

_"Stop struggling."_

 _"What are you doing?"_

 _"Just hold still, you're making this harder than it should be."_

 _"Where's Eighteen?"_

 _"She's asleep. Stop asking questions."_

 _"I want to know what you're doing to me."_

 _"Oh, for God's sake! Do you know what I've been through today? I was stuck in traffic for the best part of four hours because they still haven't cleared the damn roads. It's snowed for three days on end. Imagine having to drive when you don't need to, sitting in a fucking gridlock because nobody in the city knows what the hell to do about the weather, and then I come here and have to deal with the likes of yourself, making my life even harder. Do as I tell you or I'll push the button again! Keep your arms up!"_

 _"You're hurting me!"_


	3. Chapter 2

Seventeen shot away from the earth and out of the solar system without so much as a glance over his shoulder. Disappearing into the darkness, he carried with him the knowledge that nobody would miss him. He ignored the planets that he passed; the beautiful, dead celestial bodies that offered him no comfort, no guidance, no explanation as to who was to blame. Nothing impressed him. Within the first hour of their journey, Seventeen had come to the realisation that flying through space was not like driving on an open road, especially at the speed he needed to maintain. There was nothing to focus on, nothing to ground him. He was merely following a predefined route through a frozen expanse severely lacking in any sensation; gone was the feeling of the wheel in his hands and the wind in his hair, and so terribly cold was the emptiness around him that his only defence to it was his own body heat, elevated from his pushing himself to the limits of his speed.

Half of the initial struggle had been figuring how to act as a vehicle efficiently. As he'd shattered through the atmosphere he'd needed to keep a firm hold of Myuu, but after settling into a smoother trajectory he'd wanted his arms free. Apparently, the doctor was still anxious about flying through space without any sort of protection that an actual ship would provide. Seventeen's barrier simply wasn't physical enough to be reassuring, and the telepathic instruction for Myuu to move onto his back had been met with absolute refusal. After awkwardly pushing him into place, the sensation of his fingernails clawing into his shoulders had made him grit his teeth so hard they ached.

With nothing to distract his mind, Seventeen's thoughts droned on inexorably, going around in circles and never reaching a resolution. The memories were piling into a looming bonfire that was in dire need of being ignited, but every so often he'd hear Myuu's voice inside his head and it would startle him into attention. He gave the impression that he was a well-travelled and interstellar creature. He would point out planets, asteroids, whatever sights that were to be beheld should they have enough time to glance at them. Myuu spoke a great deal about the planet known as 'M2' on their approach, a reconstructed world of metal that the Machine Mutant race called home. It was something Seventeen wanted to see for himself.

He knew that the doctor's own planet was in very close proximity to M2. More important than seeing the sights was reducing his speed sufficiently before touchdown, or else he would most likely shatter the planet to its very core upon impact. From what small detail he could glean from a remote viewing, it seemed like nothing more than a particle of darkness suspended within its own soft, artificial glow; a synthetic little world that was purposely avoiding being found, tucked into one of the duskier corners of the galaxy. There would be no turning back. In preparation for landing, he pried his creator away from his back to keep hold of him. Myuu scrambled at him as if he were drowning.

 _Trust me a little, would you? I've got you._

In contrast to everything else, he found that breaking through a planet's atmosphere was something quite exhilarating. It responded to him and moved beneath his strength, the sheer force of his body causing a ripple of disturbance that spanned across the entire circumference and returned to him. Seventeen landed neatly and whirled up a cloud of dust and dirt at his feet, he let his disorientated creator down and watched him as he shakily found his balance, his injuries becoming apparent again in his movements.

This was the first planet Seventeen had ever visited outside of earth, so he took the opportunity to survey the environment. There was a curious humming in the background which felt like white noise against his skin, something akin to the monotonous song of machinery. It was perhaps the only heartbeat that such a planet could offer. Its stillness radiated a sinister vibe, a warning of death waiting amongst the cables or burrowed somewhere in the metallic soil. The exterior of what he assumed was Myuu's laboratory reminded him of Hell. Perhaps he'd never left.

"You are remarkably efficient," Myuu told him, still catching his breath. "I'm not certain I could get used to that way of travelling, however."

"You're welcome."

"Let's get to it, then."

As anticipated, Myuu offered no tour nor informal introduction to the strange citadel he'd constructed. It was business as usual. Seventeen followed his creator inside and realised that it wasn't just a single laboratory, it resembled an institute with a multitude of research rooms scattered about within. He noticed the copious amounts of empty space, the polished tiles and the trailing cables that ran down the walls, everywhere startlingly silent and motionless. He'd expected something else to be here, something **alive** , but the place screamed of total abandonment. One of the larger labs they passed by was in ruins, the equipment inside looking to have been destroyed beyond repair. Scattered all over the floor was a mixture of things that shouldn't have been there: debris, the internal components of machines. His eyes were instantly drawn to the gentle illumination at the back of the lab, a source of natural light and the only one he'd seen so far. It was coming from an open door situated beside an elevated platform, both of which were nestled cosily into the far corner (recoiling from prying eyes, like the planet itself). A single staircase led up to it.

Seventeen's curiosity was too demanding to accept being stifled. His body sprung into motion of its own accord, parting from the doctor to gracefully hover over and settle in the doorway. Taking in the sight of the room's shattered remains, he quickly understood that this was the embodiment of a dream well and truly crushed. For whatever reason, an abundance of water (far too green in colour) calmly glistened far beneath the podium he stood upon. Above his head arched a foreign sky and the shards of what was left of a glass dome, and from the podium stretched a walkway that led to absolutely nothing. The architecture was glaringly different from every other room he'd seen, and it carried with it a strange sensation. However, the pieces of it that were left gave him no insight into what it had been before its destruction.

"Seventeen," Myuu called. "Let's go."

"What's this for? It looks different to everywhere else."

"It was just a research room."

"What kind of research?"

"Come along."

He knew that there was no point in questioning him. They eventually ended up in some secluded corner of the complex which was just as dark and ominous as the rest of it. The doctor rushed in and busied himself with setting a few of the machines up whilst Seventeen watched him cautiously.

"Before I do anything else, I'm going to give you a brief examination and get that ear cleaned. Lie down."

There was something familiar in that simple instruction and it clawed at a tenderness he thought no longer existed within him. It was debilitating to the point that all his logic suddenly gave way to a viscous haze of terror. He remembered staring up at the ceiling whilst agile hands buried themselves underneath his flesh, the flashing lights of dusty, dead machinery, the shame that accompanied his nakedness. Blood on the floor, blood on the walls; by evening the lab would be pristine, all that horror tucked neatly away and all his screams lost to the midnight air when Doctor Gero took his leave, blue eyes ablaze in thunderheads of drifting cigarette smoke. He remembered the glittering night sky beyond his shoulders (a cruel reminder of a normality not accessible to him) and the chill of the winter breeze as it wandered into the lab. Seventeen glanced down at the rip in his jeans.

"Well?" Doctor Myuu was staring at him. "What are you waiting for?"

The fierce look in his eyes indicated that there would be no verbal response gilded enough to satisfy him. Seventeen forced himself out of his reverie and reluctantly laid down upon the lab table being offered as a makeshift bed. After a few moments of stillness there was a sudden chill against his forehead and the feeling of fingers working a substance of some kind into his skin. They were at the back of his neck and then his abdomen, just above his navel, and the contact with the latter shocked him so much that he physically flinched.

His reaction had surprised even himself. As his chest tightened in discomfort, his only focus was on controlling his breathing. Something as trivial as fingertips brushing against him shouldn't have startled him like that, but his body had involuntarily betrayed him. He looked up, gauging the doctor's reaction to this embarrassing admission of vulnerability, and shrunk back at the sight of his eyes searching him again.

"Does it hurt there?"

Seventeen found himself unable to speak. A muddled array of words was caught in his throat, unwilling to be voiced and giving way to a deafening silence. When his life had been taken from him on earth, he'd been fortunate in the sense that, at the very least, his agony had been brief. His body had been torn to pieces - he'd felt the scream of every inch of his flesh as it'd burned under the strength of Goku's energy – but, in death, physical pain had been kind enough to quietly slip away. Despite this, he'd still been left with the harrowing memory of it all, and it was proving to be an especially persistent nightmare. The phantom sensation of emptiness still manifested inside of him, and if he cast his eyes downward he thought he might even see that bright blue sky piercing through himself again.

In his mind he pleaded to not be touched, not there, not anywhere, but all he could do was shake his head. No, it didn't hurt, but even if it did – what of it? Doctor Myuu had not witnessed the moment of his defeat, had not been present to share in the disgrace of his being torn apart whilst Eighteen's delighted cries reverberated along the coast. Her joy had been the only accompaniment to his screams under the light of that midday sun, and he knew he would never rid himself of the sound. It was probably a good thing that Myuu lived on unknowing. After all, if he had seen something **that** pathetic, he'd probably have taken Gero's side in Hell.

Two small pads, connected to wires, were pushed into the gel on his skin. As he lay still, he couldn't bear to look at himself. The mutilation he'd endured up to this point was already agonising, the last thing he wanted to see was his body punctured with wiring and other foreign devices. In the past, under the mercy of some other man's hands, he would have been shut down for the duration of a process such as this and then for some time afterwards. Remaining conscious was a right he might have fought for once, so he found it cruelly ironic that, in the moment it had been given to him, he no longer desired it. But, surely, it wasn't **his** fault that the weight of his trauma was so heavy.

A burning sensation began to crawl over his skin where the pads were in contact with him. To accompany this discomfort came a sharp pain that jolted throughout his core, the sensation that something had just pierced through him and burrowed itself within. As prominent as the pain was, it quickly subsided, and instead the trace of his heartbeat resounded throughout the room, its shrill instability only adding to his shame. He watched his creator move from the computer and draw closer from the corner of his eyes.

"Turn your head to the side."

Upon giving it attention, Seventeen realised that his ear was still sore from Gero's earlier bout of viciousness. Myuu was working to soothe it, however, and the sensation of him gently dabbing at his wound gave him something to focus on.

"I'm afraid you'll have a split earlobe for a while. I will repair it surgically after it's healed."

It took a moment for those careful words to truly sink in. A _split earlobe_. He hadn't really considered it before, mostly because he'd never seen it, but he wondered just how bad it looked now. He told himself that it was insignificant, he shouldn't count the blemishes on his body; whatever had been done to him, physically, could be undone, could be **repaired**. His trust in his creator, in that aspect at least, remained as sturdy as it had been before their partnership had collapsed back on earth.

Myuu gently moved his hands away and returned to the computer. Seventeen watched his every move fervently, his eyes especially drawn to his hands. As he indulged his suspicion he caught sight of something so jarring that it made him lose focus and try to sit upright, and he was only partially stopped by the feel of whatever was hooked into him straining against his skin. He watched for a moment, unsure of himself and the state of his mind, but there was no doubt about it: something was happening on the back of Myuu's hands, as though his veins were moving themselves and pushing up against the surface of his skin.

"What's happening with your hands?" Seventeen asked at once.

For a long while he remained quiet and in thought. Perhaps it was a question that had never been asked before, or perhaps it was an aspect of him that he'd intended to keep secret, like what little strength he had. Either way, he seemed uncertain about how to respond. The moments unwound around them, Myuu's eyes averted as he prolonged the silence with his indecisiveness. The sound of Seventeen's heartbeat murmured something on his behalf.

"Doctor?"

After a little more consideration, Myuu proffered one of his hands with an air of caution about him. Seventeen took it, gently turned it this way and that, and in his own hands it seemed so remarkably frail. He had no idea what to make of the subtle changes that had taken place within the depths of his skin. A network of long, thin pathways had formed over his knuckles and the joints of his fingers, with bundles of them collected together at his fingertips and at the ends of his thumbs. He could see that they weren't veins or anything else biological in nature. They looked more akin to the electrical traces of a circuit board, only not quite as rigid; no corners and jagged edges, just fluid channels flowing from small protrusions all over the back of his hand. Seventeen shook his head in confusion.

"I'm reorganising my circuits," Myuu explained quietly, "so that I can access yours."

"Yeah, I don't know what that means but I'm pretty sure I don't like it."

He was given another irritated glance as Myuu withdrew his hand. "Will you calm down? I'm just going to look at your circuits, there's no need to get excited about it."

"Do you _need_ to monitor my heart?"

"Yes."

"Why? You're just looking at my circuits, aren't you?"

The doctor gave an exasperated sigh. His hands and forearms had disappeared into a machine in front of the computer. "I'm monitoring your entire system. You told me in Hell that something had malfunctioned, I'm making sure that everything else is working properly. In an ideal world I would have been able to do this straight after your birth, however, you know all too well about our circumstances."

"But what are you **doing** with your hands?"

"I told you before, I'm accessing your circuits."

"Over there?"

"That's what the wires are for."

In a brief moment of weakness, Seventeen looked down and indulged himself of the sight he had been avoiding until now. It wasn't as bad as he'd imagined it to be, but the knowledge that he was physically connected to another machine still made him uneasy.

"This is the non-invasive method. Without those wires I'd need to make a few incisions."

 _Non-invasive_ , was it? He took a deep breath to gather himself and looked over to Myuu. His eyes were drawn to the open wounds on his shoulder, the dark, russet blood that had seeped down his arm and soaked into his shirt. As he looked over the doctor's injured body he felt a twinge of something begin to rouse within him, but he buried it in defiance instantly. The sight made him recall the few moments he had been able to make sense of during the time he'd been paralysed in Hell, when he'd had nothing to guide him except the strident growls of his two creators as they'd tried to cut each other's throats.

"Doctor Gero did things very differently to you," he muttered.

"I am not Doctor Gero."

There had been a distinct bitterness laced into Myuu's reply, a forceful indication that the comparison between the two of them had irked him somehow. Still looking him over, finding other small cuts here and there, Seventeen trailed his eyes downwards. Myuu was still putting his weight onto one foot, the other raised off the floor and shaking just noticeably. He wondered just how much damage Gero had truly done to him. Well, if the doctor could correct the flaws in his own body, he was sure he could do the same for himself.

"Are you going to repair yourself?"

"Hush. Let me concentrate."

He turned away, quietening despite his burning need for idle talk (to both satiate his natural curiosity and to distract himself from his own fear). Amidst the chaos of it all, there **was** something making itself known with startling clarity. Somewhere between reliving the horrors of seeing his blood on Gero's hands and seeing Myuu's blood down his arm had he realised something: he no longer hated his former creator. Try as he might to grasp at the aged ghost of his resentment, once a passionate vine curling around his ribcage, his hands would remain empty and dissatisfied. Any trace of it had withered against his bones and died for a reason he could not define. The ability was gone; he simply could not hate Gero even if he wanted to. Freeing though it was, it also acted as a hole in place of part of his identity. It should have been obvious from the moment he'd heard Gero's voice trying to steer him every which way, but he'd been far more concerned with the changes he'd undergone to give the doctor any real thought.

Truthfully, the illusion had been part of the thrill. His unnaturally obsequious behaviour had been a single cog in the machinations sent spinning prior to his birth, a compliment to Myuu's ongoing guise. Taking his first breath in Hell, he'd risen to his feet in a dazed stupor, and the face of Doctor Gero had been the first thing his newborn eyes focused upon. His other creator had been equally dazed, fatigued and gazing up at him silently. He'd felt nothing in those moments, shrugged off their eyes drinking him in, been indifferent in the face of Gero claiming him as his own. After evolving, however, something had come to light from the swirling influx of new memories that'd infested his mind, namely that Gero had played a crucial role in torturing himself and Eighteen. Still, the apathy could not be shaken from him. In every command Gero had barked, Seventeen pretended to obey without question, and he'd continued to feel absolutely nothing in doing so. No fury, no pain.

The doctor's actual role in their situation had been something he and Myuu had discussed between themselves at length, within the privacy of their own minds. Their frequent telepathic conversations had been warming and reassuring. _This man will tell you that you are the ultimate Artificial Human,_ Myuu had begun cautiously as he worked to rid himself of the wine Gero had given to him, " _remember that you are more than that._ " In his vulnerability at the time, Seventeen could never have known the real meaning behind those words. In quieter moments, Myuu had touched briefly upon his time alone as he'd laboured beneath Gero (beneath, he'd emphasised, not **with** ) and how incredibly frustrating the man had been to endure. What became clear, in the end, was that neither of them particularly desired Gero's company nor his fervent need to harness the two of them. In this mutual understanding between them both - Myuu's alignment with his own and their jocose commentary behind Gero's back - Seventeen had found himself being drawn to him. Worse still, he'd found himself **trusting** him.

"Despite everything, I don't hate Doctor Gero," he offered, without any expectation of his words being acknowledged. The silence ebbed on until a break in the doctor's thoughts allowed him to reply.

"I would be surprised if you did."

"What do you mean?"

"He had me erase your resentment towards him."

"Oh." In one soft, distracted mutter, the answer to his internal questioning had been provided. However, the book had not been closed on the matter. Perhaps his questions would be endless. "Why?"

"It was necessary for you to reach your perfected state."

"I can still remember everything he did to me."

"Yes, I erased your emotions towards him, not your memories of him."

Who'd ever heard of someone being unable to transform solely because of their emotions? Had Gero made it up? He'd once admitted, after all, that he'd tried (extensively) and failed to wipe out his emotions after his reconstruction, as well as Eighteen's. Inventing an elaborate pretext had probably been a good way to get Myuu to do the job for him without the risk of being challenged. Would Myuu have taken on something apparently so difficult if there'd been no real reason to do it?

"I think he was lying to you."

"Yes, of course he was. Not necessarily regarding your ability to transform, but about other things I've no doubt. You should pay no further mind to him, you know. I've had enough of that man to last me several lifetimes, and I don't intend for us to see him ever again."

No, the danger did not lie in Doctor Gero and his dwindling relevance. It lay in the fact that, if Myuu could erase his emotions towards him, he could erase his emotions towards **anyone**. Most dangerous of all, he could wipe his affection for Eighteen, and Seventeen was sure that he wouldn't hesitate to do it after the fiasco on earth. Was that something he could bear? Though, if his memories remained, he would remember that he'd loved her once, and what would be the good in that? His narrowed eyes searched the ceiling senselessly as he mused on and on, his mind working as hard as it had during their journey here through space. Making up for the all the times he'd thought nothing at all.

In his reflections regarding this potential threat he began to stoke his fury, but its development was disrupted by the sudden onset of movement within him, somewhere beneath his skin. His hands flew up defensively, fingertips searching over his chest, but there was nothing external to be plucked away from him. He looked over to his creator and demanded an answer with his expression alone. They made eye contact and Myuu gave him yet another look of disapproval.

"I told you to calm down, didn't I?"

"What are you doing to me!? I can **feel** that!"

"Haven't you listened to anything I've said? I'm accessing your circuits!"

"But-" Seventeen stopped mid-sentence, uncomfortable with how desperate his voice sounded. It wasn't that he hadn't been listening, he was just struggling to comprehend it all. The doctor was standing by the computer, a distinctly separate entity, and yet he was somehow present within himself. It was disturbing.

Myuu had very quickly lost interest in the protest and returned to continuing with his work. Seventeen clenched his fists, determined to suppress the instinct to get up and bolt away; frozen in stark repulsion he traced the light movements of the doctor's fingers as he pushed around within his chest. It might have become something tolerable after a while, but it all went out the window in the moment he'd felt a sharp, abrupt pain twinge throughout his entire upper body.

He looked down and instinctively searched himself for a physical explanation, but, of course, the doctor was working on the inside. Clutching at his skin, the acute sensation that something within him had been severed flooded his senses. If he was bleeding internally, what could he do to protect himself?

"What the hell are you doing!?" He questioned, his voice erupting in a fierce roar which reverberated around the room.

Startled by his guttural cry, the doctor removed his hands from the machine and looked over to him, "Seventeen, none of my creations have ever made this so difficult. I simply removed a part of your system-"

Seventeen hadn't given himself sufficient time to even process the words properly. He shrieked some form of disapproval and leapt up in a bout of fury, tearing the pads from his skin and throwing them to the floor. Myuu backed away from him with horrified eyes and it only encouraged him to follow. With his finally being disconnected from the machine, the trace of his heartbeat dissipated into a mechanical whir and then faded from existence altogether. The silence that followed, with his terrified creator looking up at him, was incredibly satisfying.

"No, no you **don't** get to remove parts of my body as you please! It's **my** body and it was perfectly fine before!"

Myuu's small voice trembled out from the near-darkness. "I – I don't know what you're talking about. **I'm** the one who developed your body."

"Yes, doctor, you may have developed my body but that doesn't make it yours! What's the deal, anyway? Weren't you supposed to be just looking at my circuits? What happened to that, huh?"

"Seventeen-"

"Let me guess, you lied about that too!"

" **Listen to me**! It's not a matter of who 'owns' it,I'm the one responsible for the way you function. It seems that there's an abundance of Gero's technology still present within you and I deem it unnecessary. Detrimental, even. Why would you assume that I intend to harm you? I'm trying to help you!"

"You're both so careless, aren't you? I bet you can't even differentiate between what you poisoned me with to what **he** did."

"How can you speak that way? Doctor Gero put his soul into creating you. So did I."

He shook his head with exasperation. He wasn't in the mood to hear any passionate pleas. "Whatever the hell you just did to me, it hurt."

There was a brief, uncertain pause. He'd opened his mouth to argue or say something in his defence, but instead he offered only a quiet apology. "I'm sorry."

Heady fatigue descended in the place of his anger. How was Myuu able to drain him so quickly? So much had happened since his birth, since he had been thrown into Hell, perhaps it'd all taken its toll on him. Perhaps the sensation of being tired was the only thing he knew with any certainty now: tired from being a static body to which things happened, with reasoning and half-hearted justifications presented only to appease him thereafter. Pushing his hair back, he chanced another question. "And what about my system?"

"You are functioning properly."

"If that's the case, why do you look so worried?"

Myuu gave him a questioning glance, something that was becoming a regular occurrence. Rather than supplying him with an answer, he eased into another train of thought. "I want to see the lower level code when we test your energy absorption, so it's not going to be as easy as this. I need to write some compatibility software-"

"Oh, wonderful. And how long is that going to take?"

"A few days at the most."

Hands resting upon his hips, Seventeen stared up at the ceiling in strained thought. "I see."

"Goku shouldn't have been able to kill you. Whatever it was that gave him the advantage, it needs to be corrected, regardless of how long that takes."

Well, that much was true. Seventeen gave a brief nod in defeat and the two of them fell silent again. Even as he explored the idea of simply taking off and disappearing into the frozen abyss above, he found himself being dragged in the other direction, a tight rope around his neck pulled taught and demanding him to stay within the warmth of his creator's domain. Everything around him was suddenly startling, as though his mind had lifted itself out of an immense fog. Why had he been crawling around in greyscale whilst Myuu lived in technicolour?

"Come."

He lowered his gaze and met Myuu's eyes. Something inside him begged him not to comply, but in perfunctory obedience he trailed his creator's footsteps as they moved to some other place within the complex, a small room which resembled an office. As Myuu entered, Seventeen stood in the doorway and immediately took notice of the rounded windows at the far back. The sun, an abnormally waxen stranger with a honey-glazed radiance, was beginning to set.

"Stay here, I'll be back."

At his departure, which he did not have the energy to even question, Seventeen looked around. So repetitive was the décor that, had he shut his eyes and been moved by some other force, he might not have noticed the difference. He turned to rest his back against the wall and slumped down to the floor. Being as idle as this was a foreign concept to him, and his mind had been overwhelmed to the point where he could no longer think clearly. He disliked the way Myuu operated. He understood Gero's methodology to some extent, at least had **seen** his blood over the foreign utensils drawn out from his body, but with Myuu it was all hidden in the ether, smooth and unquantifiable and unseen. The pain he inflicted was tucked away behind a curtain, made real only within the constraints of his mind. Stranger still, as he braved a glance at his abdomen he realised that the pads he'd ripped from himself had left no mark. Not a single trace of blood.

The sky was saturated, its delicate lilacs and greens now darkened with the sun's descent. The evening felt unnaturally calm, as if the planet were holding its breath and waiting for the moment it could exhale. He wondered how Eighteen was doing back on earth. The muddled fragments of his memory were hazy at best, but he knew that things hadn't been the same between them since his first resurrection many years ago. Crawling uneasily back into his body, he'd had no idea what to with a life that offered him no direction nor purpose. His sister, in her senseless freedom, tailed the ghost of happiness with a fervency he'd never witnessed before, whilst he, in his addled boredom, faded from the foreground to sit alone in the forest, looking up at the pines and the stars and the other romanticised artefacts spoken of on earth. Beneath these silent witnesses he had been supposed to find love, find meaning, find himself.

He'd come to appreciate the sensation of daybreak, the dappled sunlight on his skin, the dew on his lips if he slept in the grass overnight (which he often did, just for the hell of it). The bitterness of coffee, sweetened mildly, had been a previously undiscovered delight. Alone with the birdsong and the rush of water over pebbles, he'd longed for an afternoon of tremulous lovemaking with some other broken soul, or a night of intoxicated laughter amongst the network Eighteen had settled herself into. But it was all too foreign and meaningless. Silence followed him with unending loyalty. In the cabin, on the phone, in this very room. One grey morning in the middle of absolutely nowhere, he'd woken up and realised that once a victim of solitude surrenders to the silence, they seldom shake it off. He'd been heavy, lifeless, drowned in a gasoline of wretchedness. It turned out that pretty words were sufficient to set him alight.

 _You're perfect._

The doctor returned with two glasses in his hands, one of which he offered to him. Seventeen took it with hesitation; finding himself in near-darkness once again, he couldn't make out what exactly was in it.

"What is this?"

"Spiced rum."

"I didn't think you'd be the type to invest in a spirit from earth."

"You are quite naïve to assume that earth is the only planet in this galaxy capable of producing sugar cane."

Despite the inherent truth in that reply, Seventeen wondered if he should just throw it over him in a show of his agitation. He also wondered for what reason he had been given it. The red wine in Hell, which Doctor Gero had not offered to him, had emerged from a need to celebrate their early successes. Now it seemed that he and Myuu were drinking together simply because there was nothing else to do. At this point, he was not sure he could accept that he was drinking for tragedy, or to just forget that he had, ultimately, failed to fulfil his purpose and rendered himself utterly worthless, perhaps more so than prior to the fusion. Looking at the glass, he only wished that someone would take his head and smash it against the floor hard enough for him to stop thinking.

"Are you alright?"

Seventeen looked up, surprised that he'd asked. Perhaps the fatigue was finally beginning to mark his face. "What do you mean?"

"Your skin. What you did earlier – please don't do that again."

"It's fine. Stop worrying needlessly."

"My concern isn't 'needless'."

God, he was infuriating. "I want to see M2."

"Well, there's nothing stopping you from going. Are you not free to travel as you will? You should try some of that, you know."

Seventeen's gaze quickly flicked between Myuu and the untouched glass on his desk. It was a silent and autonomous request for reassurance that he'd seemed to understand, because he immediately reached over, picked up the glass and downed the contents in one swift motion. Unsure how else to respond, Seventeen gingerly braved a small sip and was pleasantly surprised.

"It's good."

Myuu gave an amused hum. "I don't know about the situation on M2. The device we used for communication between that planet and this one was destroyed."

"How was it destroyed?"

"How do you think? It would certainly be beneficial for you to go over there. You can find out what's happening and give me a much-needed update."

"Yes, doctor."

With that tone of voice, he could only assume that Goku had exercised his usual destructive ways here before Myuu had been sent to Hell (thinking on it, he didn't really know much aboutMyuu, did he?). It was funny how fate had been keen enough to follow the two of them all the way across the galaxy.

He sipped at the rum idly, his mind now quietened somewhat. It was warm and pleasantly numbing, made more enticing with its silvery veil of sugar. He wanted to ask Myuu about M2, about everything here, about what had happened before he'd descended from Hell onto earth. It looked like **he** wanted to talk about something else, however, and his expression indicated that he was struggling to articulate his thoughts. Seventeen watched him as he shuffled a little, moved one leg over the other.

"Tell me the truth," he began quietly. "Tell me what happened before the fusion."

Seventeen looked down at his glass. It was already empty. "I explained back in Hell. I tried to get Eighteen to join us and she refused. That's all that really happened, there's nothing more to say."

He tilted his head slightly. "I think there is. What else? Why did you attack her?"

"Well, she attacked me first. I just retaliated."

"For what reason did she attack you?"

Oh, boy. He just wasn't going to let it go, was he? Though, he had asked a good question. That specific memory was especially fuzzy, but he knew that the emotion associated with it would never fade from him. "I killed her husband."

"Hmm." An uncertain pause. "You were not told to do so."

"I didn't need to be _told to do so_."

"Then, he attacked you as well?"

"No, I just… his words. The way he spoke to me. He was confusing me, he was being patronising. He was angry at me, they both were."

"Why?"

"I'm not sure. It might have been because I'd destroyed a few cities at that point. I remember that there was a road-"

"You did **what**!?"

He looked up and gave a shrug. "I just destroyed a few cities."

"Damn it, Seventeen!" Myuu jumped up from his chair, consumed by fury _just like that_ , and it was that much stronger with the lenses that covered his eyes gone. "What was the plan!? You were supposed to pass on the message and keep low from that point forward!"

"Hey, everyone else on that shithole was having fun, why couldn't I!?"

"Why do you **think** everyone else was released!?"

"I don't know. Everyone in that place wants revenge."

"Not a single soul in Hell could defeat Son Goku, or any of his accomplices for that matter. **I** knew that and so did Doctor Gero. Yes, everyone jumped at the prospect of 'revenge' - but their individual desires played no part in the grand scheme of things. Their collective efforts were nothing more than a distraction - I targeted Vegeta with Hell Fighter Seventeen purposely; after Son Goku he was the next considerable threat. I couldn't allow him to get to you before you'd fused."

Ah, right. He'd fought Vegeta so that he wouldn't have to fight Vegeta. He remembered now. Myuu was glaring at him, yet again, and he had no idea what to say. "Well, I never needed your protection."

"Listen to yourself! Everything was systematically calculated prior to our leaving Hell because the risk was far too great for any mistakes. You weren't supposed to engage Eighteen, you weren't supposed to engage **anyone**. Do you understand? Your fusion was a race against time and you put yourself – both of us – in danger needlessly. You deliberately disobeyed me, even back then!"

His grip on the glass tightened. " **Shut up**. Don't try and make this into something it isn't. I still did what you asked of me."

"I can't believe you…" Myuu's voice had lost its strength. He stood around looking defeated and pained for a while before he continued. "Listen. The Saiyans seem to have flocked to earth as a breeding ground for some reason. I had no idea so many of them were there – there,of all places in the galaxy!" He paused, looked down at his hands on the desk. "It can meet no other fate than complete eradication. It **needs** to be destroyed."

"I _know_ , doctor."

"You… you are not making this easy. You've made your position clear. If you still feel as you did… I don't care what happens to Android Eighteen. She's not my concern. I just want her out of the way so that we can proceed."

He narrowed his eyes. It sounded like Myuu was trying to offer a compromise. "Are you saying you don't want me to kill her?"

"You are refusing to do so, are you not?"

He thought about it. He wasn't sure if Myuu would ever really 'accept' complete refusal of a command. The fact that he'd even asked about it was strange. "I don't know. Can you make her into a Machine Mutant?"

"I have the ability to do that, yes."

"I mean, **will** you?"

"To serve what purpose?"

"It would have been fun if she'd joined us." That had been his reasoning, anyway, on the day that he'd gathered enough strength to finally approach her. He shouldn't have bothered.

"I'm afraid that 'fun' is not worthy of my time and resources."

"I didn't mean it like that. I meant, when I asked her to join us before, if only she'd just agreed."

"Oh, get a hold of yourself!" Myuu snapped. He was sat back down with his head in his hands (that's all this was, that's all it ever had been: a great big fucking headache.) "I don't know what possessed you to try taking matters into your own hands like that, but in any case, 'if only' isn't going to change the reality of the situation. We have to move **forward** , Seventeen."

He innately wanted to shout back at him and tell him that he had no understanding of the situation, but he was overcome with a bout of drowsiness that was far too demanding. He set the empty glass down on the floor somewhere and lay on his side, resting on his arm. He did not hear the doctor's voice again that night.

For hours he drifted in and out of consciousness, heavy lidded and warm when he roused. His gaze always drifted back to where he'd last seen Myuu, sat across from him with his unwavering eyes focused on the monitor. Sometimes he was there, sometimes he was not. Usually, his lithe fingers would be crawling the keys and the sound of typing would lull Seventeen back to sleep. Light footsteps by his head, he'd awaken to moving shadows across the tiles. In broken moments he heard angry whispers from somewhere in the distance, in a voice that was familiar to his own. Something cold approaching. Clouded eyes searched for Myuu. Sometimes he was there, sometimes he was not.

 _I was supposed to be perfect_.


End file.
